The Iron Man

Iron Man is a fictional character that appears in comic books published by Marvel Comics. The character first appeared in Tales of Suspense #39 (March 1963), and was created by writer-editor Stan Lee, scripter Larry Lieber, and artists Don Heck and Jack Kirby.

Born Anthony Edward "Tony" Stark, he suffers a severe heart injury during a kidnapping and is forced to build a destructive weapon. He instead creates a power suit to save his life and help protect the world as the superhero Iron Man.^[1] He is a wealthy industrialist and genius inventor who created military weapons and whose metal suit is laden with technological devices that enable him to fight crime. Initially, Iron Man was a vehicle for Stan Lee to explore Cold War themes, particularly the role of American technology and business in the fight against communism. Subsequent re-imaginings of Iron Man have gradually removed the Cold War themes, replacing them with more contemporary concerns such as corporate crime and terrorism.

Throughout most of the comics history, Iron Man has been a member of the superhero team the Avengers and has been featured in several incarnations of his own various comic book series. The character has been adapted for several animated TV shows, as well as for the 2008 live action film Iron Man where he is played by Robert Downey, Jr.

Premiere

Iron Man's premiere was a collaboration among editor and story-plotter Stan Lee, scripter Larry Lieber, story-artist Don Heck, and Jack Kirby. In 1963, Lee had been toying with the idea of a businessman superhero.^[2] He set out to make the new character a rich, glamorous ladies' man, but one with a secret that would plague and torment him as well.^[3] Lee based this playboy's personality on Howard Hughes,^[4] explaining, "Howard Hughes was one of the most colorful men of our time. He was an inventor, an adventurer, a multi-billionaire, a ladies' man and finally a nutcase".^[5] While Lee intended to write the story himself, he eventually handed the premier issue over to Lieber, who fleshed out the story.^[3] The art, meanwhile, was split between Kirby and Heck. "He designed the costume", Heck said of Kirby, "because he was doing the cover. The covers were always done first. But I created the look of the characters, like Tony Stark and his secretary Pepper Potts".^[4][6]

Iron Man first appeared in 13- to 18-page stories in Tales of Suspense, which featured anthology science fiction and supernatural stories. The character's original costume was a bulky grey armor, which later turned golden in his second story (issue #40, April 1963), and then redesigned again as a sleeker red-and-golden armor starting in issue #48 (Dec. 1963), drawn by Steve Ditko. In his premiere, Iron Man was an anti-communist hero, defeating various Vietnamese agents; Lee later regretted this early focus.^[2][7] Throughout the character’s comic book series, technological advancement and national defense were constant themes for Iron Man, but later issues developed Stark into a more complex and vulnerable character as they depicted his battle with alcoholism and other personal difficulties.

From issue #59 (Nov. 1964) to its final issue #99 (March 1968), the anthological science-fiction backup stories in Tales of Suspense were replaced by a feature starring the superhero Captain America. After issue #99 (March 1968), the book's title was changed to Captain America. Iron Man stories moved to the title Iron Man and Sub-Mariner in April 1968, before the "Golden Avenger"^[8] made his solo debut with The Invincible Iron Man #1 (May 1968).

Writers have updated the war in which Stark is injured. In the original 1963 story, it was Vietnam. Later, in the 1990s, it was updated to be the first Gulf War,^[9] and then updated again to be Afghanistan. However, his time with the Asian Nobel Prize-winning scientist Ho Yinsen is consistent through nearly all incarnations of the Iron Man origin, depicting Stark and Yinsen building the original armor together. One exception is the direct-to-DVD animated feature film The Invincible Iron Man, in which the armor Stark uses to escape his captors is not the first Iron Man suit.

Source : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_Man